Text: T0945; 首楞嚴經, *Śūraṃgama-sūtra; 大佛頂如來密因修證了義諸菩薩萬行首楞嚴經

No

• T0945; 首楞嚴經, *Śūraṃgama-sūtra; 大佛頂如來密因修證了義諸菩薩萬行首楞嚴經

"It is widely assumed by scholars that this is not a translation of an Indian sūtra, but a text originally written in China."

Entry author: Michael Radich

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• Title: 首楞嚴經, *Śūraṃgama-sūtra

No

• T0237; 金剛般若波羅蜜經
• T0273; 金剛三昧經
• T0845; 佛說尊那經
• T0945; 首楞嚴經, *Śūraṃgama-sūtra; 大佛頂如來密因修證了義諸菩薩萬行首楞嚴經

Benn summarises scholarship by Mochizuki, Lü Cheng, Lo Hsiang-lin [Luo Xianglin], Stael-Holstein, Demieville, Gregory, Faure, Jorgensen, and Jiang Wu that has argued that T945 is an apocryphal sūtra composed in China at the beginning of the eighth century (57 n. 2; 61 ff.). One of the notable studies Benn cites is a monograph dedicated to T945 by Kim Chin-yol.

Benn notes that there is significant confusion in the external evidence, which contain a number of different accounts of how, where, and when the “translation” was made. Later historians and commentators trued to cover up these discrepancies, but only added to the confusion. In this literature “clouds of suspicion” swirl around the possibility that the text was in fact authored by Wu Zetian's minister Fang Rong and his son Fang Guan. However, Benn claims that there is no conclusive proof to connect T945 to the Fangs. Benn suggests that rather, T945 "may have been written in response to certain statements concerning matters of correct practice contained in an influential work by...Yijing.” He thus still associates the text with the milieu at the end of the reign of Wu Zetian.

Benn closely examines the relation of T945 to Chinese literary sources. He demonstrates the unique way in which T945 “adopts and adapts themes found elsewhere in the literature of medieval China, Buddhist and non-Buddhist.” According to Benn, T945 incorporates indigenous Chinese elements into standard Buddhist taxonomies.

The seventh fascicle contains a twelve-fold rubric that, to the best of Benn's knowledge, is not attested in any “genuine” sūtra (Lü Cheng suggests this unusual categorisation is adapted from a passage in Paramārtha’s Diamond Sūtra T237; Lü Cheng, 195). The text lists twelve types of beings that are said to exist in saṃsāra; the first four are familiar in Indian Buddhist discourse, but the next six reveal what Benn calls a “distinctly Chinese conception of the natural order.” By this he means that the imagery employed is drawn from Chinese knowledge practices. For example, we find reference to blind jellyfish (shuimu 水母) a creature otherwise unknown in Buddhist texts, but featured in the Wen xuan 文選. The text goes on to discuss wasps that forcibly adopt other creatures; cannibalistic birds; demonic owls; and a beast called broken mirror (pojing). In addition to these creatures, Benn highlights Taoist themes presented in a Buddhist frame, and the use of a distinctive Chinese demonology. The T945 teaching on the seven elements, which Benn adds “may itself be apocryphal,” uses an extended analogy of the use of mirrors to ignite moxa/mugwort, a typically Chinese method of creating fire from the sun, in order to explain tathāgathagarbha. These passages illustrate the ways in which T945 blends typically Chinese knowledge practices with Mahāyāna ideas.

Benn then demonstrates that one may detect within the thought of T945 a trend towards a kind of militant Mahāyāna asceticism which explicitly condemns various practices and beliefs. For instance, an overconfident meditator leaves his unsettled mind exposed to psychic attack from demonic forces and spouts heterodoxies about destroying stūpas and statues of Buddhas. Benn interprets this as a reaction to Chan rhetoric which locates authenticity in the mind rather than sūtras and statues, as found in the “Bodhidharma anthology” from Dunhuang. Another scenario appears to be directed at those who promote sexual practices associated with esoteric Buddhism. Benn takes this to indicate the attitudes of T945's author(s) toward other religious practitioners and contemporary teachers “during the turbulent religious scene of the early eighth century.”

Benn lists two other texts dating to the same period, which are closely related to T945: T845 can be seen as a precis of T945; and T273 shares several similes and metaphors with both texts.

Entry author: Sophie Florence

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